Goodwood 74 MM

[Pandora]

I suspect the tunnel will be elongated away from the track, and when you look at it, the 'junction' between the access road and the live circuit at that point puts the tyre wall at right angles to the track on a straight where they will be accelerating hard - to me, a set of tyre fronted gates or similar which continue the tyre wall across the access road whilst the racing is live would help contain any incidents within the circuit. The head on nature of the impact definitely contributed to the final 'flip'.

Accidents within circuits are difficult, and can be looked at in one way, but when racing cars, or bits of them, enter the public areas, there is a real chance of them being game changers, and a whole different set of constraints come into play.

I was nearly hit by the screen of Juan Barazzi's 250LM at St Mary's and was close to the point of Stretton's shunt in the Bizzarini, both huge accidents, but within the scope of 'racing accidents', but that wheel and the tunnel will have huge implications.

The answer is to keep the 2 apart - either by barriers, removing people from areas, or circuit design. Or stopping.

Once it's happened once, it's foreseeable, so must be dealt with.

Of course, Goodwood have been through part of this before when they were in the high court following the death of a Big Healey driver at a track day several years ago, and the design of the barriers was questioned. As GRRC had sought (and followed) the advice of experts, they were held to have done as they should, and not at fault. In this case, they must do the same again in response to these incidents (part of their MSA licence conditions anyway, I'd imagine)

Funnily enough, the H&S officer job at Goodwood came up late last year, and it was only the move that stopped me applying - I hope the new guy is not having too bad a time of it!

Al

[Pandora]

From 10/10ths, Via Autosport's Nostalgia Forum:

Dear fans,
I'd like to update you about the driver from the Lola T70 in car number #2 which crashed yesterday during the Bruce McLaren Trophy at the 74th MM at Goodwood. He is my dad and in consultation with other family members we decided to give you some information. He is a bit shaken and bruised, but conscious. Apart from the abrasions and cuts he has broken a rib and two vertebrae. The good thing is that there isn't any damage to the spinal cord. Let's hope he'll recover soon!
If there is anyone who has some more information, video's or other imagery please contact me at samvanderwerff@hotmail.com
This would be really valuable for us.
Thank you so much for your support and information.
Kind regards,
Sam van der Werff


Another lucky man!

Al